Hospital seeks order compelling ill patient to leave

A hospital has sought a temporary order aimed at compelling the departure from its premises of a patient with a serious medical condition who has been treated there for some months.

Everything the hospital had power to do for the patient has been done, but he is refusing to leave and go to another facility, the hospital claims.

Gardaí had been called but the patient remains at the facility, the court was told.

The man’s treatment at the hospital “had plateaued” and there is a long list of people waiting for a bed at the facility, Simon Mills SC, for the hospital, said.

Injunction sought

The hospital wants the High Court to grant orders including an injunction compelling the man to leave the facility and move to another medical facility.

When the matter came ex parte (one side only represented) before Mr Justice Paul Gilligan on Thursday, he granted the hospital’s lawyers permission to serve short notice of the injunction proceedings on the patient.

The judge ordered that neither the patient nor the hospital can be named in media reports. He said the court would review that order when the matter returned before the court on Monday in the presence of the patient and/or his legal representatives.

Simon Mills BL, for the hospital, said it was “not the case” the hospital “was throwing the patient out on the street” or that the patient had nowhere to go.

Transfer arranged

It had been arranged for the patient to be transferred to another hospital after several other options had not worked out, counsel said.

Everything the hospital had in its power to do for the man had been done, Mr Mills added.

The patient, after making demands on the hospital which it could not meet, refused to leave the facility and move to a new one, he said.

Unusually, prior to the patient’s admission, the hospital had entered into a contract with him whereby the patient had agreed to leave after his treatment programme had been completed, counsel said.

The contract was entered into due to the patient’s particular circumstances and the hospital maintained the man is not honouring that agreement, counsel added.